Contemplative Practice on the Breathing Phenomenon to Attain Clear Knowing

The ignorance of clearly knowing the contemplated dharma falls into the phenomenal realm, taking the phenomenal realm as true and real, whereas clearly knowing means knowing the arising and ceasing of the phenomenal realm and its lack of truth and reality. The contemplative practice (vipaśyanā-caryā) in the intermediate stage is very important, and the turning point from ignorance to clarity is very important. When one contemplates and observes the principle behind the phenomenal realm, that is clearly knowing; when the manas clearly knows, meditative concentration/meditative absorption (samādhi) characterized by the equal cultivation of Samādhi and Prajñā will certainly appear. This process may take longer, because the foundation from past lives is somewhat weaker, so this life involves more hardship. One may refer to the method of contemplating the breath practiced by Cūḍāpanthaka in the Śūraṅgama Sūtra: Cūḍāpanthaka contemplated the breath without ever leaving the tip of the nose, with extreme single-mindedness, and in the end he attained the fruit of an arhat of the fourth fruit, and moreover also cultivated the fourth dhyāna.